Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Over the years people have come up with lots of analogies just for Iraq. For example, I have heard that Iraq is like... "a quagmire," "a deep hole," "a descent into hell," "an oil fire," "embers in the night," "a cancer patient," "Vietnam," "South Korea," "a teenage pregnancy," "a variable-rate mortgage," and the list goes on.

Guantanamo also have a variety of analogies too. People have said it's like a Soviet gulag, which actually originated with London Amnesty International, and plenty of people have chimed in on that. Turks call Guantanamo "Silivri," after the largest prison in Europe located in Turkey.

But what's the use comparing something to something else when the original is just as bad or worse? I'm not sure if any one thing can capture all aspects of the war on terror. But this weekend two of my friends and I decided the war on terror is like a game, a board game, the goal of which is total global domination. Like a game of Risk.

We used that concept to create a commercial for television to advertise a protest in Tacoma on March 21st. We used the concept of playing a game of Risk to frame the expanding war on terror under Obama's administration, so that it more closely resembles imperialism. As Obama announced on February 27th, the war in Iraq is as of now - "over" - but 30,000 to 50,000 troops will remain in order to "advise," "equip," "support," and "train" Iraqi security forces. He said "all" combat missions in Iraq will end in 2011, but there will still be American "counter-terrorism missions" which will most likely happen under the radar. So the occupation will not end, it's only getting bigger.

He also said there will be a combat troop surge in Afghanistan and Pakistan in the next few months, and according to budget research group, the National Priorities Project, Obama will actually spend more on military defense expenditures than George W. Bush. There are not a lot of details on how the new military budget will be spent, but he asked for a 75 billion dollar war "supplemental" budget, making 2009's military budget a new spending record.

John Stewart breaks down Obama's foreign policy here.Our friend who works for a Tacoma-based cable provider, Click!, helped us get access to cheap ad space, so that our 15 second and 30 second ads can be seen on CNN, the Discovery Channel, MTV and USA. Here is the ad. Go to demonstrate253.org for more information about the march.